Plumeria rubra is a deciduous plant species belonging to the genus Plumeria. Originally native to Mexico, Central America, Colombia and Venezuela, it has been widely cultivated in subtropical and tropical climates worldwide and is a popular garden and park plant, as well as being used in temples and cemeteries. It grows as a spreading tree to 7–8 m (23–26 ft) high and wide, and is flushed with fragrant flowers of shades of pink, white and yellow over the summer and autumn.
Its common names include frangipani, red paucipan, red-jasmine, red frangipani, common frangipani, temple tree, calachuchi, or simply plumeria. Despite its common name, the species is not a "true jasmine" and not of the genus Jasminum.
The common name "frangipani" comes from the Italian Frangipani family, a sixteenth-century marquess of which invented a plumeria-scented perfume. The genus name honors Charles Plumier, who was a French monk of the Franciscan order, and a botanist.
In its native range in Mexico the common name is cacaloxochitl or cacaloxuchitl. The name comes from Nahuatl and means "crow's flower". It is also commonly known in Mexico as Flor de Mayo. P. rubra was declared the national flower of Nicaragua in 1971, where it is known as sacuanjoche In Spanish, frangipanis are also referred to as alhelí, alhelí cimarrón, and suche.
P. rubra entered Southeast Asia via the Manila galleons from Mexico to the Philippines in the 1560s. It retained the Nahuatl-derived name in the Philippine languages where it is known as kalachuchi (also spelled kalatsutsi), or calachuchi in Philippine English.The Nahuatl name is also partly preserved in the Ternate common name tsjutsju, derived from the Philippine name. In other parts of Indonesia and Malaysia, it acquired different names like cempaka or chempaka derived from the resemblance of its fragrance to the champaca tree. It also acquired the name bunga kamboja (literally "flower of Cambodia") in Malay, referencing its foreign origin. Though it is not native to Cambodia nor is there evidence that it spread from Cambodia. Due to its associations with graveyards and death, it is also known as bunga kuburan, literally "grave flower".
In the Pacific Islands where it was introduced in the late 19th century, P. rubra is known as melia in Hawaii, and tipani in the Cook Islands.
Elsewhere, it is known as champa (or a derivative thereof) in India and Pakistan. It is known by many names in Brazil, including jasmim-de-caiena, jasmim-do-pará, and jasmim-manga.[9] In Portuguese, it is also known as flor-de-Santo-Antônio. In Cambodia it is given the names châmpéi krahâ:m (also romanised as krahom, meaning 'red'), or châmpéi slük sruëch, while the French term for the species is frangipanier à fleurs rouges. In Sri Lanka, it is known as araliya in Sinhalese. In Myanmar, it is referred to as mawk-sam-ka, mawk-sam-pailong, and sonpabataing. In China, it has the common name ji dan hua, and in the United States, it is referred to as nosegay.
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